Little things can mean a lot in a home renovation, and on one recent project we positively changed the lives of our clients in just 58 square feet. This family lives in an older 3 bedroom, 2-story house where the rooms are, as is typical, small, defined and enclosed.

With young children and an informal lifestyle, the family wanted to open up their home’s floor plan, enlarge the kitchen, and create a more convenient space to enter and exit. We knew this would require moving one or more load-bearing walls — making the project a bit of a challenge — but it’s usually the right answer for improving circulation within the home and allowing for more functionality.

Our client agreed that a having a transitional dining area for everyday use was more important than preserving their formal dining room. That gave us the flexibility to enlarge the kitchen with additional counter space, a breakfast bar, a dishwasher and other missing conveniences. We combined the den area, enlarged kitchen, and new dining area into one cohesive, multi-use space for cooking, homework, TV watching and everything else.

Bringing the whole renovation together is an 11’ 6” x 5’ mudroom addition that adds usefulness and ease to the new living environment. Now family, friends and guests have a place to take off coats, shoes, mittens and more without disrupting the rest of the house. This small space has made a huge impact on keeping everything neat and tidy.

As you can see from the “Existing” and “Remodeled” floor plans, the new arrangement doesn’t just look better, it has our clients feeling better — and they’ve been ecstatic at how relaxed and comfortable daily living has become. Getting into our clients’ heads and unscrambling all their design thoughts into one winning design solution is what our design/build process is all about.

Existing Floor Plan

Remodeled Floor Plan

So what design challenge are you facing in your home? If you have an interior space problem you’d like solved, please email me at Michael@MichaelMenn.com and I’ll try to present a solution in one of my next blogs. Thanks for the opportunity.

Sincerely,

Michael